At the mention of stopping for the night, Sam drops the harness and begins rotating his arms.

"Damnable mud... At least the wagon held up pretty well.

...Wonder how long this rain's gonna last us."

With that, Sam begins focusing his mind and expanding his will, trying to cover as much distance as possible with three things in mind: Is it still raining at the edge of my cast, where is a place we can stop for the night in this range, and where can we scrounge up something more edible than the crap in the wagon?

((Focus spent: 29%. If I understand our system properly, this means my max focus is reduced by 10% until a good night's sleep, correct?))

She sighed dramatically. "Fine. Whatever makes you feel more soaked with testosterone is fine by me." She pointed at him with the handle of her cane. "But you'd better wake me up if anything happens. Especially if that jackass shows up. I have words for him."

She lowered her cane and muttered to herself in a mildly exasperated tone. "....stupid melodramatic............vague sonuva...... running from God...get us attacked....." She rapped her cane on the softening ground and looked up at Jerry again. "So. Let me know. There needs to be a bit of friendly interrogation, neh?"

Edward sighs and thinks warm soft thoughts. "I think...If we use 3 posts, in a triangle form pyrimid... then wrap the canvas around it leaving the top middle open... there could be room for... you know... the...hot...Burning stuff..." Edward racks his brain, "...in the middle... not room for 4 but 3 maybe."

A communal tent is made with little trouble and the night passes with nothing particularly interesting happening.

The rest works its wonders on the party. Hooray!
[Everyone is restored to full Health and Focus.]

The sun rises... um, well, when the sun rises. The watch says six-thirty, but it could easily be wrong in some way, shape, or form. However, "sunrise" is a hazy concept since you can't actually SEE the sun on the horizon through the cloud cover, BUT you CAN see what COULD be the sun rising through it. It's stopped raining (Saminiah's assumption was correct; the rain ceased before his watch happened) but it's still as cloudy as ever.

Anyone who's paying particularly close attention to the northwest can see something odd in the distance. You can't tell what it is with much detail without some kind of telescopic vision.

Sam steps out of the tent and scans the horizon, looking for something that might be the sun, and notices the object in the northwest. He focuses on it passively, slightly curious but mostly dismissing it as a sleep induced hallucination of some sort.

With some force of effort, Jerry locates some tubers beneath the ground. If he wants any apples, he'll have to use some of his seeds to grow a tree and that's likely to take a bunch out of him. There are otherwise no trees at all on this ridiculously bland landscape.

(Actually, Edward is the cat...Note all the fur... But it's ok, I had planned on ed being around at that point anyway. He was the last watch, so he would already be up.)

Edward had taken the last shift on the watch, so he was already up...Kinda. He was -sorta- sitting down and starring off into space. About a minute after his teamates wake up, he becomes aware of them, and spends the next minute or so convincing himself to get moving.

After a difficult inner battle, he stands up and begins to walk around the tent, where he sees jerry doing... something. just after he comes into view, he hears someone speak, "Workin' on it now, Sammy,". Edward yawns again and then addresses the speaker. "G'Morning, Uhm, What are you up to?"

About now, His stomache is growling, loudly, but Ed doesn't pay much attention. He is still groggy enough that he hasn't become entirely aware of it, yet.

Virginia, who had been boredly eavesdropping on their conversation, rolled over and tossed a small cement trowel at the ground at Jerry's feet. It sank in easily, as if she'd thrown a knife and barely missed him. Hard to tell whether she meant to hit him or not. Probably not. Virginia liked food as much as anyone else, and Jerry was the one who seemed to do the best at finding it.

"That thing's important. Don't bend it or dent it. It should hold up to anything you need to do and if by some chance it isn't sharp enough to accidentally hurt you, let me know and I'll fix it."

She remained on the ground, reclining lazily and waiting to see if anything interesting enough to warrant her attention was likely to happen that day. When she noticed the oddity on the horizon, she decided that it was at least marginally more interesting than the quest for breakfast and gazed after it idly.

I need to get up and get myself some tea at some point. Eh. Long as I'm not moving around it shouldn't really matter yet.

"Also, I'll need that back when you're done. Need to clear a little space for a fire," she continued.

Edward is tired, but is still listening in on the conversation, "More plants? Ehhhhh..." Edward may be tired, but at the mention of food he becomes very aware of his own hunger, So edward decides to take matters into his own hands and try to sense for any edible animals around.

Assuming nothing interesting is done on the remainder of the way by the party, the group arrives in Holdenburgh.

Compared to Jansen, it's a fairly large town, with several two-storey buildings on the main avenue. If you have any delusions that finding the Hunterjaar's office will be difficult, however, remember that it's usually in the town hall or the capitol building.

Towns like this are usually good places for Hunters to meet and swap stories, as well as there being a good likelihood that there's a depot or two where they can swap collected ExP for upgrades. Hunters sometimes sell off their ExP to other Hunters if the price is right...

The town is also currently playing host to some of the War Kux-Holder's army, since the last conflict with Quebec has recently ended and, thus, deserters from both sides have taken up banditry.

The town bustles, and the best place to do the job will be at the Hunterjaar's office, provided you're willing to wait long enough in line and/or you can rig up an impromptu meeting. You do, after all, hold three whole Kuxen.

Edward is slightly dazzled. This city is far larger than any town he's been in. He feels sure that he might get lost if he doesn't take care.

"Hey, you guys all want to go meet the hunterjaar? Or should we send one person while the others go and do other things? I think that we should split up, but If you think not..."

Secretly, Edward hopes to buy an upgrade using his exp. Then see if he can't trade the relatively useless shards of metal he found earlier to a blacksmith or something. They are junk, but even junk has a little bit of value. If theres one thing living on your own teaches you, its that being frugal can't hurt.

Maybe he could trade these shards for a plastic trinket. He doesn't expect anything particularly special or useful out of these dealings, but what he has now is somewhat useless to him. And a little plastic trinket can always be given to some kid for a variety of reasons and purposes.

Jerry felt a little sad. He had just recalled that this was one of the towns his dad "visited" in his youth. He knew no one would recognize him, since he'd never actually ENTERED the town. And not even his fellow Hunters knew his full name. It just felt like guilt, was all. The sins of the father...

"I'm sure our Kuxen'll get us some pull..." And Jerry headed off in the direction of the office...

Virginia headed off with the others toward the office, barely sparing a thought for the other attractions of the town. It was just a town. The sooner this job was over the sooner she could continue learning things that were actually interesting rather than being led in verbal circles by some shadowy man.

Edward sees plenty of people going about their business. This town is significantly more lively than Jansen, and he DOES have a job to do. However, since he left the group, he doesn't really know where anyone else is...

------------------------------------------

The three members of the party who AREN'T in the process of shirking their duty make their way towards the center of the town to find the town hall with the customary two entrances as well as a third entrance for a variety of town offices, none of which should be even vaguely interesting to the group as they have no bearing on the mission itself.

The main entrance is where anyone with business with the town or seeking an audience with an official of the city, as well as anyone who wants to buy or sell Kuxen for goods or services in the town (since a single Kux is kind of too large for everyday use) and thus Kuxen can be traded for Holdenmarks- the local currency- and Holdenmarks can be traded for Kuxen, at a fixed rate. Usually you get fewer Holdenmarks for a Kux than you need to spend to buy one of the city's Kuxen.

The other entrance leads to the Hunterjaar's guild- not just an office in a town as large as this, but an actual half-building with a set of apartments for the goings-on of the Hunter-business in the city but also a small barracks to lodge transient and travelling Hunters who need the rest for free. After all, it is generally public policy in Ontario to be extremely generous and venerable to Hunters, so they shouldn't have to look very far for quarters in which to rest.

Both entrances have lines that extend out of the doors, both made up of normal citizens- some of which want to make complaints, file papers, and the like (which is why they're going to the town hall) and the other line filled with people who want to make reports about dangers in the countryside or periodically the extremely wealthy or well-respected citizen seeking to hire a few Hunters to take care of some business, post-haste. There are also a few members of the Ontario army in the line, probably reporting the presence of a Tyrant somewhere in the region.

It's probably best to check into the Hunterjaar's guild before asking the Lord Mayor's office for the Chemist that Jansen needs. Just keep things in order, and beaurocracy is definitely something not to be on the bad side of.

Still, the Janseners are kind of agitated about the whole thing, so perhaps a report at the guild wouldn't be a total waste of time.

Edward is lost, and he is beginning to second guess his whole plan. He thinks to himself Well this was a bad idea. Way to go Ed, always getting into trouble... Oh great, we didn't agree on a meeting spot, We might never find each other!

At the thought of being permanently seperated, edward decides to find the hunterjaar's place of operation and hopefully find his group. He walks up to a local man who doesn't look too busy and asks, "Excuse me sir, Do you know where I might find the hunterjaar?"

I'm so tired of this nonsense. Get this, get that, check with those people before you get some damn medicine or even wipe your own ass.

Needless to say, Virginia thought that this mission was shaping up to be a seemingly impossible combination of bad things.

One. It was tedious. They were running errands for one town because they wanted something from someone else. She was surrounded by people who had little to no appreciation for the things that were important to her. Edward never seemed to have anything interesting to say, Sam was all right but too damned quiet. Jerry wasn't so bad. His thoughts on various topics, most notably the topic of Virginia's work, were contrary to her own and often contrary to his actions. At least he had them, though. She had so far failed to find any common ground with any of them except for the occasional argument. It was better than nothing, but it wasn't enough to make her feel like any of this was worth the time and boredom.

Two. Despite being tedious, it was somehow inexplicably dangerous. She was not used to being attacked by flying fire-breathing messengers of God. Avoidance of that sort of nonsense is exactly how she'd managed to live this long. She was older than any Hunter she'd ever met because she didn't go lusting after adventure. She carried a weapon, sure. But she was not used to using it against anything that would fight back. On the end of a sword the average overambitious scholar was just a regular person. She had no problem with chasing away or hunting down other members of her profession who didn't meet her exacting standards. Most of them weren't prepared for it. It was combat that worried her. She'd lived a long time, and that meant she felt differently about death than normal people. They were gambling their lives. As far as Virginia knew, she was gambling eternal youth. That raised the stakes a bit.

So what? She was risking her safety and well-being for a cause that was, quite frankly, boring. If there were knowledge or advancement at stake for her or for anyone else she'd feel quite differently. But why? What was the point of all this nonsense? So far this mission had been a total clusterfuck and she wasn't about to line herself up for any more of it if she could help it.

Fucking hell. I need a shower and I need a beer. I'm so sick of this crap. Let's just get this over with.

With that, she decided to do no more and no less than what she was told. If that meant talking to the appropriate people about the appropriate things then that's what it meant. The sooner she finished this the sooner she could move on.

Jerry sighed. He was annoyed with this mission too. It was too much unnecessary danger, and at the same time, not enough excitement. There's nothing worse than dying bored.

But, he was also accustomed to waiting. Most days his father went into town, he was gone the whole of the day. And in that time, he just waited. He wrote in the dirt, he played with handmade dolls, and what not. It didn't bother him after a while.

It was better than going IN to town.

"Sam's right. Let's just go to the office and then get housed for the night... join me if ya like."

And Jerry headed that way, backwards, hoping Ginny or SOMEONE would participate in making this day end faster...

Edward arrives at the guild at about this time. He had almost made a wrong turn a few blocks back, but had made it apparently. He stops at the entrance and scans for his group. That's when he spots one person he knows. Jerry is moving away from the others.

"Hey guys." Ed waves then moves quickly over to meet them. "Where're you off to, jerry?" Ed's not sure where jerry is going, but he assumes that virginia and sam can take care of themselves, so he decides to keep jerry company. Ed falls into stride with his teamate as he waits for a response.

Ed's thoughts were a little scattered but were on a subject similar to his teamates. He was the sort who tried to be optimistic about other people, and this practice was expressed in his oppinions of his teamates. First there was sam, a rather large guy who seemed nice enough. Although he did seem a little quiet... His strengh was a good thing to have, without him ed might have had to help pull the wagon, and that would have been... annoying. Then there was jerry. Jerry was interesting, he knew some book stuff and had oppinions on things. He just seemed a little... odd. Unless Ed was thouroughly mistaken, jerry had tried to subdue those enemies from before by throwing... grass... at them. Now, Maybe ed was missing something... but grass? That just doesn't seem like something thats going to be all that effective. Virginia... Ed was just glad he hadn't said anything about anything. Virginia seemed...'grouchy' to put it mildly. And who knows what kind of innocent comment ed might say offhand that could offend her? She was smart, and that could certainly come in handy.

Secretly, ed was more afraid that he would be unable to really contribute. He was willing to help, and volunteered often, but he was so inexperienced that he was liable to just mess everything up. As for the mission itself, edward was not really annoyed with it. He hadn't been on more than a couple and he was eager to get more experience. He hoped that in the future he would be able to help the people from now on, instead of just living off of them.

Virginia followed Jerry, but kept a good distance behind him and Edward. It was plain she was much more interested in wrapping this up than in talking to them at the moment. Too much on her mind.

What the hell was all this for? There were better ways she could contribute. What a lot of Hunters didn't understand was that there was more than one way to help. Not everything had to be running all over hell killing things for shits and giggles. That wasn't her job. Virginia's job, in her mind, was to make a contribution where someone else couldn't. Do what somebody else might not. That, for now, meant dedicating decades of her life to finding answers. She knew that she wasn't the only one around who needed them. She was just the only one willing to openly admit that they were top priority.

Let someone else handle the mindless killing of dangerous monsters. Anyone with a good weapon or a strong arm can do that.

She hoped to get this done with quickly, and maybe take the others to a bar and show them a decent evening. They all needed it after the line of meaningless insanity they'd been dealing with.